


Salt Water

by rawvomit



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Drabble, Gen, Lonely kids, M/M, Sadstuck, Solo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-24
Updated: 2013-02-24
Packaged: 2017-12-03 11:10:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/697625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rawvomit/pseuds/rawvomit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And sometimes he wonders what the sun might look like leaking between the leaves of trees.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Salt Water

Uneasy fingers thread in blonde hair, and he tugs and pulls at the locks he finds there. Calloused skin running over hip bones as sharp as throwing stones, and soft moans are lost to the sea air.

The sweltering salt slicks over freckle peppered flesh and the heat is almost suffocating, his blood is pulsating and feverish, eyelashes fluttering as he struggles to take a breath. 

His lips are worn, his eyes are tired, he finds no picture of beauty when he notices himself in a looking glass. All there waits in his reflection is a remnant shadow that just might pass for a younger brother, a figure to be almost proud of, the scuff of a heel on a dirty sidewalk. 

But here, under careful hands he is spoiled with affection, and with no recollection does he bring forth the vilification of himself. There are no angry words bred by inner loathing or protests from an unsatisfied self where he has to stand against the heavy ocean before him, where only empty sky awaits him and he asks himself to do more. 

He begs himself to be stronger than he is, to petition his shoulders to lift the world up onto his back, to demand that his legs support the weight of a thousand lonely nights, of a few hundred thousand human corpses, a few million handfuls of water. One girl on a far away shore, with an invisible friend she calls her mother, in possession of a tool that can take but cannot give. An heiress apparent who's body has grown soft on cakes baked at her leisure, who's doted upon by a father who's whole life is her. 

A ghost on an island in a past erased from the history books. 

A ghost with a sun warmed smile and sun kissed skin, with a voice thick like the red gold of honey and eyes soft as the new grass after snowfalls.

But there is no grass here.

There is only ever concrete and metal, peroxide splashed on split knees and bloody knuckles.

Salt.

Water.

Salt.

Water.

Gasps are stifled by the density of the air, smothered by humidity and loneliness. Platinum locks cling to a sweat drenched forehead, and he can feel himself buckling, as though the world were spinning. 

Spinning out of control, a spinning top on a needle point end, toppling, toppling, toppling, he succumbs to the oblivion, he dives headfirst into tempestuous waters, he drowns himself in his own need, lungs filling with heavy pleasure, heavy sadness, his ribs are crushed by the invisible girth of it, this demand, this silent oath of a lonely boy in a lonely ocean who swore that he could do it all. 

But still he is only a boy and no matter how many birthday candles he hasn't blown out and no matter how nobody held him when the ocean roared in violent swells, and no matter how his lips are worn or his eyes are tired, he will be a boy.

So when he is done wondering how the ghost's breath might feel against his neck, or how his chest might press against his own, he sleeps.

That's how children deal with sadness.

They sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> I'll write something serious one day I promise.


End file.
